


Heartstopper

by hisui



Category: Mujin Wakusei Survive/Uninhabited Planet Survive
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-15 01:26:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5766649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hisui/pseuds/hisui
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In his quiet, stoic life, there have only been two moments in which he has felt his heart stop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heartstopper

**Author's Note:**

> This is one of the first pairings I ever fell in love with. Please enjoy~

No matter what he pretends to say or do or feel, he can remember that day like it was yesterday. Wide, bright eyes----tears, he imagines, of fear and sadness and anger--- and screaming, but it remains one of those ancient silent movies, with only the rough patch at the back of his throat and the resounding thump of his heart back to life to remind him that it ever happened. For weeks, he does not trust himself to even speak more than two words at a time, terrified of what may have come out, because he has not grieved. He’s not allowed to grieve. Because that voice in the back of the head that whispers all the what-if’s he’s stubbornly refused to think about, well, it’s maybe not as far off the mark as he thought it had been.  
He’s only lost a rival after all. Other people have lost sons, friends, protectors... he feels the uncomfortable sensation of tension in the area right behind his eyes, and stops thinking. He’s got to move forward, or move backward, or just move somewhere before he loses his goddamnmind over something that should have just been a nightmare.  
So he drops out and enrolls somewhere else. Somewhere he can barely remember the name of, but his teacher recommends with some sort of face, and he kind of lives, avoiding as much human contact as possible because a person like him, he has discovered, isn’t really supposed to have friends. A couple of years at the same place has afforded him a calm non-existence, moving and moving until he can no longer feel his feet touch the ground.  
And no, he doesn’t technically see the point, but he can’t afford to be selfish. He’s still got a family, even if he hasn’t seen them in person in years. How long as it been, he wonders at one point, but he can still remember Louis’ voice bleeding in with vivid detail, and he knows it hasn’t been long enough. 

* * *

He sees her on the first day of classes, as late as he is, though a glance at her panting profile reveals that her situation is clearly not one of planned precision. To avoid unnecessary idle conversation he always arrives a minute before the bell rings, just early enough to get to class on time, but not late enough to warrant a scolding from the resident student moral committee representative.  
He can’t stop himself from smirking though, because today’s rep is Menori, and even he knows the woman’s sheer rigidity. But that only lasts a few seconds, and by the time he gets to homeroom, his expression has faded entirely.

* * *

The saddest thing, he realises upon meeting and angering an arrogant blond that he knows will only create trouble, is that the closest he’s come to laughing in three (was it four?) years is when the kid threatens to have him expelled. But he doesn’t laugh and instead says something he can’t quite remember, flat and dry and suitably stand-off-ish because he’s played this game before, and for some reason always seems to win.

* * *

The transfer student is an idiot, he decides. One of those must-save-everyone-by-putting-myself-in-danger types that he recognises with a ripple of tension in his gut as he climbs up the wall to release the hook. He leaves before anyone can see him, because that familiarity will never lead anywhere good. 

* * *

Of course she’s in his group, he thinks. It’s like Fate trying to crush every little thing that he has left, because even though he doesn’t cause trouble, doesn’t like it, doesn’t even like people in general, he’s destined to be a trouble maker.  
He resigns himself to his fate as he straps himself in, wondering what will happen to him now. 

* * *

When they are preparing to warp, he feels it, an unsettling chill at the back of his head that he’s only felt once before, but he closes his eyes and waits anyway.  
They’ve been cut. He realises this almost immediately, seeing the red of the gravity storm, and wonders how they’re going to die. It would be almost welcome had he not had a bunch of other people with him that didn’t deserve to die, had not one of those people been her.

* * *

He doesn’t question why she’s ever had to drive an escape shuttle, but somehow he knows, and the feeling unsettles him for some reason he doesn’t want to find nor admit.  
And when they land, water snakes and huge stomping things and all, he curses himself over and over again, because he feels relieved that he’s still alive. 

* * *

When they bring up the subject of who should be the leader, he immediately knows where this is heading. But at least he can’t screw up anything anymore; he knows better than to be in charge of anyone’s life now. And so when they vote Luna--Louis-- in, he offers his meaningless support with a smirk, because things are somehow looking up.

* * *

He tells her everything. And he doesn’t know how the hell it happened either, just that one minute, her blue eyes were boring into him, and the next he’s bawling. He would really like to enunciate that feeling with some sort of curse word, but all he can feel is grief and fear, and his hands just shake thinking about everything he’s not supposed to---no, hasn’t let himself think about for four full years.  
And she just sits there, all patience and understanding and perfection, and he wants to hit himself for breaking down in front of someone who would go to the end of the galaxy for him, for anybody, but couldn’t possibly understand. But then she says this one sentence, and it’s beautiful, the most beautiful thing he’s ever heard, and somehow, it fits. It fits so well he’s almost disturbed, and he can hear a voice in the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like Louis that’s telling him that someone else has crept into his heart.

* * *

He should have known.  
They would have enough luck to survive on that wretched planet for a half a year, but not enough to make it out alive. His luck always seems to run that way, enough to cover him and then some, but never enough to cover everyone. So when she tells him, them, that she’s going through with the suicide mission he originally suggested for himself, he gets this ugly, twisted feeling in his gut, but can’t manage to choke out a single word beyond her name.  
And when she tells them that she’ll continue even if her body turns to dust, well, that’s less a twist or a stab, more of like the result of someone forcefully plunging their clawed hand into his chest and squeezing before ripping out his heart artery by artery, vein by vein, until all he can feel is something that shouldn’t even have a name, and all he can hear are the sounds of his own screams.  
Luna, his heart whispers, before it stops for a few long seconds, bleeding out as the tightness in his chest and head from years ago creeps back in before he can stop and he’s so close to breaking into honest tears, to just collapse back and give up--half live---when he sees her body floating in the space around them.  
The buoyancy of the relief that he feels when she opens her eyes is enough to fuel a day long anti-gravity basketball game.

* * *

During their first proper conversation after the debacle, he tells her jokingly, “Maybe I should have just let you die at school.”  
She turns sharply to look at him, and her features don’t even wrinkle as she processes the information. “You would always go out of your way to save a life,” she says after a pause.  
“And you always go out of your way to risk yours,” he retorts.  
She doesn’t say anything but gives him a half-smile, a tired smile before leaning over. He catches her on his shoulder, and this time, doesn’t let go.


End file.
